The Pendragon's Hall

John Kerry barely waited to leave the Vietnam War Memorial, before declaring to an audience in Virginia that Bush "has not learned the lesson" of Vietnam. Of course the lesson was that if America is going to undertake a just war against an evil empire, they should go in to win it. Seems to me Bush has learned that lesson.

Why will no one call Kerry on this? He is politicizing tragedy and remembrance for political ends. If Bush were to do it, the press would be all over him. This Memorial Day, remember the countless men and women who gave their lives to make and keep this country free. Remember especially, in your prayers, the men and women who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan so that not just we, but others in this world, could live in freedom. "Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends."

The headline on AOL news gloats: "Iraqis wrangle over president to replace Saddam," and the story itself devotes about one paragraph to explaining the headline before plunging off into a rant about violence in Iraq and Saudi Arabia.

How soon we forget. Our own nation was not expected to survive. Because we've lasted two hundred plus years we've grown comfortable and assumed we were always stable. But the United States too was born in the violence of revolution and outside help from European countries. Still, no one expected the new form of government to work here. Everyone was surprised when the government managed two terms of Washington, who then retired rather than seize military control, and a term of his Vice-President, who everyone knew was his handpicked successor. But the real stunner came in the election of 1800. A hardfought electoral race had ended in the House of Representatives. It had been the bitterest, most partisan campaign yet and many predicted that with the advent of a president whose views on government were pretty much antithetical to the outgoing president, the experiment of democracy would self-destruct into violence. It did not happen. The transition of power from John Adams to Thomas Jefferson showed the world that the same people who could riot in the streets could show restraint and reason in governing themselves.

I do not want to open myself to the charge of blind idealism here. I have often wondered whether our views of the equality of all men, at least as applied to Arab's self-government, is true. But it could be. In the months that follow the Iraqi people could prove to us that they can do more than riot and pull down statues. They could elect a president who would protect their liberties. Those who wished for another choice could choose to restrain themselves and their followers and live on until the next election...much like we do here and have done for years. Power could move safely and peaceably from the interim government to a permanent democracy. The new government could choose to crack down on terrorism and accept the friendship of the United States, as an older brother of sorts. We were born in a very similar way and we have survived. Iraq could, at least in theory, do the same. A little History always puts things into perspective.

Today in Washington DC, a new memorial honoring the so-called "Greatest Generation" was unveiled. This monument to the achievements of our World War II veterans has been a long time in coming, thanks to special interests groups' activism. Go figure. Former president George H.W. Bush, himself a World War II vet (at least Bill Clinton didn't have the audacity to show up), declared that due in particular to the efforts of our military at Normandy, the 50th anniversary of which is coming up next week, we "helped to save the world."

Indeed they did. At that time, as at this time, the United States stood shoulder to shoulder with Great Britain and was willing to sacrifice everything to save the world from totalitarian dictators bent on total domination. Today, as well, we face a worldwide threat, from the Arabic versions of Hitler and Stalin. And with the response garnered by a few hundred casualties, one is grateful that this generation, with three treason-laced TV-networks and traitor-operated newspapers like the NYT and the Washington Post, was not called upon to face the evil of Hitler. Our soldiers today could do it. They are as noble and as skilled as ever they were. But what about our resolve? Can you imagine facing the enormous daily body count that the World War brought? I only hope that somewhere deep inside of us still smolders the fire that "saved the world" in the 1940s and that it won't take another terrorist attack to rekindle it. Perhaps the dedication of this new memorial, honoring those who stood toe-to-toe with evil and overcame it, will stoke the flame. America, like it or not, is the protector of the civilized world. We have responsibilities; let us live up to them.

The Democrats are really getting quite good at calling the kettle black. Their dogs in the media are bellowing now that not all congressional leaders, even Republicans, share the attorney general's grim prediction of possible terror attacks this summer. As far as I can see from the story, however, the only comments offered by Republican lawmakers are that Ashcroft should have clarified that the terror threat has not yet been raised. They have not called into doubt the intelligence itself unless, as usual, the media is relying on "Republicans" like John McCain. Humorously enough, any difference between Republican leaders is a newsworthy event but when Teddy Kennedy turned on John Kerry last week, only the conservative outlet NewsMax reported it. If it's newsworthy to report divisions among party leaders, why not Democrats? But I digress. Democratic lawmakers, in particular Chuck Schumer, are casting doubt on the intelligence, saying that since these threats "supposedly" exist the fact that they have not raised the terror level must mean the intelligence isn't that compelling. Let's leave aside the fact that to raise the terror alert, specific threats must be named and specific targets picked out. The clear implication is that Bush and other top Republicans are politicizing the threat in an election year in order to give them an advantage at the polls. (After all, even partisan media can't deny when the facts are faced America is safer with Republicans in power than with Democrats.) And after all, why shouldn't they? There's a comment line below. If you think there's one good reason the Republicans shouldn't exploit something like this, let me know. The Democrats have been politicizing everything since last year. Since when is something wrong only when Republicans do it?

Former VP Al Bore (no, that's what I meant, that's not a typo) has set a new low in partisan politics. Actually, his whole party has. Never before in American History, to my knowledge, has a former president or vice president taken an opportunity to undermine their own nation and their successor. During JFK's bungled handling of the Bay of Pigs invasion, his predecessors, Eisenhower and Nixon, who had a plan of attack that probably would have worked, chose to publicly support him and offered no criticism. Yet Bore, along with Klinton and Karter, continues to attack Bush and undermine the war effort. American leaders used to be men. Now they are back stabbers. But there is a bright side: Bore is such a good name for Al that he sunk his own campaign and Howard Dean's campaign, and John Kerry doesn't want anything to do with him. Nobody listens because everyone's asleep. Don't wake them.

Muslim authorities in Egypt have found news way to convert people. While Christian missionaries concentrate on making their case, whether socially or academically, and leaving it up to the individuals, Islam uses force. Young Egyptian women are told, upon entering a shopping mall, that they have won a contest and must come upstairs to sign for it. What they actually sign, Voice of the Martyrs reported today, is a confession of Islam. If they refuse to live by this confession, they are often sexually abused. Abu Ghraib is alive and well...under Muslim management. Many of these girls vanish, never to be seen by their families again. Some religion of peace, this.

A new study is also apparently out showing that Al Qaida still operates at roughly 18,000 strong. The International Institute for Strategic Studies claims that they must be expected to continue their attacks on the US. Well, duh. The only way to neutralize these people is to kill them. They're like termites. The news story from AOL of course put a spin on it, saying that Al Qaida is "far from crippled by the US-led war on terror." Why not, "due to European indifference Al Qaida remains at large"? The War on Terror, this newest chapter in the ongoing struggle between good and evil, has been extremely effective. Iraq and Afghanistan are on a fast track to democratic sovereignty, and Al Qaida is being dismantled. They are not eliminated yet certainly, but they are being eliminated. Giving up now will not help. The real kicker came when one of the study's authors commented: "Efforts to defeat al-Qaida will take time and might accelerate only if there are political developments that now seem elusive, such as the democratization of Iraq and the resolution of conflict in Israel." So if we can't do that right away, what then? Iraq has been an autocracy since the days of Nebuchadnezzar...it won't become a democracy overnight. It's moving more swiftly than I certainly expected. As for Israel, it will be resolved only by the destruction of the Palestinian Authority. Like all lame articles lately, the IISS' study is full of woebegone naysaying. The world is going surprisingly well, but it isn't Heaven yet. That's not Bush's fault.

Over the weekend I learned that Attorney General Eliot Spitzer (D-NY) and several others are leading "a criminal investigation" into big oil and what profits they might be making in the rising prices of gasoline. Only a Democrat could lead a "criminal investigation" into people making money. Somebody should tell him about Senator Kennedy (Treason Party--MA) coming to Buffalo, NY, to hold a fundraiser for his reelection bid two years hence. Might it not be considered a criminal matter for a senator to raise money for reelection from non-residents? Or for that matter, is treason not a crime? But of course all the worst crimes will be ignored by the Democrats and their cronies in the media...just like they always are. And for the record, the "crime" in "big oil" has nothing to do with Texas tycoons, but everything to do with OPEC and Arab dictators squatting on millions of dollars worth of oil but unwilling to release it. Our government's hands have been tied by leftist loonies posing as environmentalists and we have been discouraged from seeking alternate sources of oil, that would send less money (not substantially, but every little is gain) to these barbarians. Bush ought to take a lesson from the Nixon administration and give OPEC an ultimatum: Increase oil supplies or I'll decrease your food supplies. The food we send them only feeds terror cells and illegal armies anyway. Nixon did it with the Soviet Union once. There was a lot of screaming, but he got his way. If America would get over the disease called civilization, at least when dealing with Arab tycoons who hold the Western world hostage, the world would be a better place.

Nancy Pelosi, House Minority "Leader", continues showing the remarkable penchant for treason that Democratic top dogs have. Today she claimed that Bush's Iraq policy displayed "incompetence" and several other less complementary words. Even CNN said the diatribe was "harsh".

If there weren't so many Democrats in top positions in this country they would be downright funny. Bush is "incompetent" for leveling two terrorism-prone dictatorships, liberating millions of downtrodden Arab-types, and setting Iraq and Afghanistan on an inside fast track to liberty-based governance...all in one term of office. Shall we review what the oh-so-competent Clinton did in two terms of office? Well, we know he blew up an aspirin factory in Sudan and killed the night watchman...that was a nice touch. Let the world see how good the American military is. He did a lot of damage to a camel in Afghanistan while supposedly targeting Osama Bin Laden. He let the master terrorist go time and time again to carry out murderous attacks on Americans from the 1993 WTC bombing to the embassy bombings and the USS Cole. He lobbed a few missiles into Bagdhad to target Saddam Hussein's "weapons of mass destruction" but never actually got off his hiny enough to end the programs. He empowered the North Korean government to continue making nuclear weapons while America turned a blind eye.

If this is competence, and Bush is incompetent, I'll take incompetence every time.

Senator John McCain ("R"-AZ) is one Republican, if you want to call him that, who is dear to the hearts of media, mainly because he trumpets their call for higher taxes and sapping the war effort. McCain, who's a fairly well-off man, being a senator, is lecturing the general American public on what they ought to sacrifice. Attached to any tax hike would probably be a salary hike for Congress. For what, I'd like to know? Tax hikes are good...for Congress. But in fact studies show that high taxes bring in LESS, not MORE revenue for the government. Not to mention saddling the economy because nobody has any money to spend. Ask the British. They've had a socialist economy since World War II and many PM's have risen and fallen trying to pay for it.

Latest story from Iraq: the US again has supposedly fired on civilians celebrating a revelry. This could be included, if it need be included at all, in a footnote in a story on the war in general, and the participants' opinions of the President could be left out, but no. The media continues its treason hike and its hand-wringing over what may not even have happened. And if it did, what then? I'm beginning to sympathize with the woman who called Rush Limbaugh today and said, "Get out soldiers out of the country and any innocents...if there are any. And then drop the bomb." Iraq can be a parking lot for Israeli soccer games. I have a better idea though...the "accident" if it happened at all happened because of Iraqis shooting off guns in celebration. It's a cultural thing I guess. Why don't the Iraqis change their culture at least temporarily? That's what Christians are forced to do in America to avoid offending anyone. As an added incentive, these Iraqis will live instead of die. Sounds like a good deal to me.

Oh, any by the way, if any reps from ACT (Americans Coming Together) approach and say they're interested in electing "responsible Democratic leadership" please tell them those three words are mutually exclusive to each other. Thank you. (Yes, I am ticked off...royally. Cross me and you'll have it double.)

Aww, isn't it nice? The NYT is going into ecstasy that "presumptive nominee John Kerry" (why does everyone still call him that?) and former frontrunner Howard Dean sat down this week to play "Hearts" together. Dean apparently won--well, at least he can win something. They're making a big deal out of the new "odd couple" in politics. One wonders if it's marriage or a civil union. It's a sign the Democratic Party is coming together to defeat President Bush, they rejoiced.

Oh yeah? Perhaps they should explain why an independent poll of registered Democrats this past week found that roughly 40% of registered Democrats would vote for John Kerry if they had the primaries to do over and when given the choice between him and Senator Clinton, 47 to 44% said they favored Clinton. That anyone would favor Clinton over anyone except maybe Osama Bin Laden shows desperation in the ranks. The leadership of the Democratic Party may be uniting to support Kerry (although their dog, the mainstream media, continuing to refer to Kerry as "presumptive", certainly makes one wonder) but there is no evidence the American people will follow. Am I sorry about this? Not at all. Kerry is probably, outside of Hillary Clinton and Jacques Chirac, the absolute worst candidate, and that includes Howard Dean, that could have been chosen. I am glad to know he is unable to connect with the American people and, barring a satanic miracle of some sort, unlikely to win in November. Think Bush 2004.

"This is it," (Kevin Garnett of the Minnesota Timberwolves) responded. "It's for all the marbles. I'm sitting in the house loading up the pump, I'm loading up the Uzis, I've got a couple of M-16s, couple of nines, couple of joints with some silencers on them, couple of grenades, got a missile launcher. I'm ready for war."

And for this he was made to apologize. "I'm a young man," he said, "and I was totally thinking about basketball not reality."

Give me a break. In an era where Democratic lawmakers openly attack men and women in uniform and those who seek to lead them, a basketball player is called on the carpet for using military language. How feminized are we? Now if he had been pretending, like Ted Kennedy, that he was just as useful to the country as the soldiers, that would be offensive and inappropriate. But sports is competitive and so is war. That's why liberals can't stand either. If it were up to them, the most vicious contact sport would be making daisy chains with the Arabs.

You know, just for this, I'm rooting for the Timberwolves from now on.

Only in Congress.... The AOL headline says, "Did Confusion Cost Lives?" The story of course is that the oh-so-necessary 9/11 commission is studying emergency respondents to the terrorist attacks to see if it could have been done better.

Well, duh. And I think the necessary steps are being taken. In the aftermath of the attacks, local emergency responder chapters began reforming their groups to meet the new demands of terrorism. And in any situation confusion can cost lives...but there's no need to rake people over the coals. That was a strange day. I suspect not even the famed 9/11 commissioners were completely calm that day. I know I wasn't. I can't even imagine what it would have been like on the scene. I must concur in the end with Rudy Giuliani: it was "the greatest rescue attempt" in history. Those who responded deserve our help, not our criticism. If the 9/11 commission can, for once, see beyond political bickering and do this, then for once they will have done something useful. Rather than look for a scapegoat (there are plenty in the previous administration), their main goal should be that it never happen again. Thus far, all they have done is increase the risk.

There's a scene in LOTR III in which invading orcs use catapults to send the severed heads of fallen warriors back into the besieged city of Minas Tirith. The recent butchery of Nick Berg and Daniel Pearl has certainly brought this scene to mind. And why not? The butchers of Al-Qaida are not any higher up on the social scale than orcs. Milton said it first--man is the crown of God's creation and when he falls, he can become "lower than beasts." Look no further than Al-Qaida and Baath Party loyalists. If this murder was truly "justice" or even "vengeance" for the Iraqi prisoner "abuse" then the purported "abuse" should have been reciprocated and "justice" in return for these bloody murders should be for Saddam and a few others to face the same fate. But it will not happen. The United States suffers from a disease called "civilization"--something most of the Arab world has never heard of, except that they know it's a disease. It's time to stop treating Al-Qaida like naughty children and more like the subhuman creatures they have made themselves.

So where is the public outcry? Iraqi insurgents blew up a building today, killing two twin Iraqi girls and some other civilians. In another area, they shot and killed two Iraqi women working for coalition forces. If the US had caused these deaths, the public outcry and the finger pointing would already be beginning. "They're barbarians and they're careless" the people would be chanting. "Killers of women and children!" But when the real barbarians appear the naysayers are nowhere to be found. THIS is one story they report objectively.

I never did answer the question about Rumsfeld. But the news media answered it for me. The latest story is how Dylan Klebold's parents are refusing to take responsibility for what their son did at Columbine a few years ago. Although they noticed "some signs" that their son was involved in bad things, they weren't responsible for his actions.

Neither was Rumsfeld. It makes as much sense for guilty soldiers to pass off blame to their superiors as to accept the full responsibility. But logic never being a strong point of liberals, the media will continue casting doubt till after Bush's reelection this Fall. It is not an issue of discovering the truth but of scoring political points and they will take what they can get.

Well, the news media keeps beating a dead horse so I guess I will keep beating it in return. Did Rumsfeld order an expansion of a secret CIA program to sexually humiliate and torture Iraqi prisoners to gain information?

The only real surprise in this whole story is why it's such a big story. Rush Limbaugh and others have correctly pointed out that were these pictures funded by the NEA, liberals in Congress and the media would be telling us we need to "understand" what the artist was thinking. It's an amazing double-standard. The other aspect of this is the new story's lionization of the CIA for refusing to continue the program because they supposedly were using it on "cabdrivers, brothers-in-law and people pulled off the street" instead of terrorists. I get tired of repeating this line but repeat it we must, it seems: Abu Ghraib was a prison for those who had been caught trying to kill American soldiers. The people in there were not civilians in the sense of non-combatants. Suspects were detained but only the guilty were kept. This doesn't justify some of the things done to them, but it gives the lie to the idea that they were arrested while walking along, minding their own business. Besides, hasn't anyone ever heard of military justice? One man in a platoon does something wrong and the whole platoon gets punished. Angry about this, the man's (or woman's, so as not to be sexist)comrades punish him (her) as well so they'll be sure not to do it again. Maybe the "average" Iraqi people, whom we have been assured so often just want peace and stability, could help by tattling on the insurgents and helping the US restore stability in the area if they want to make sure no mistakes are made. It's worth a try.

I read online this morning that the governor of New Hampshire has signed a bill blocking gay marriages performed in Massachusetts from being recognized in his state. Although the story itself took no sides, you'd better believe this governor will be reviled in the major news media before too long. And all for following the constitution. It is the privilege of the legislative and the executive branch to form laws for the polity, whether the nation or a state. The courts may only interpret the laws. People worry far too much about the Patriot Act and the supposed "broad" powers it gives to the President without thinking that already the judicial branch is overreaching its authority by force-reading a state constitution to protect what is clearly against the law of nature and nature's God and then demanding that the legislative branch write a law that reflects this "finding." I hope more governors will react the way New Hampshire's governor has. It's about time people stopped playing dead for the courts.

Listen to this: Now Mullins hopes Kerry will pick Edwards because he thinks the Southerner will be popular in Tennessee, especially with women.

''We want a winner,'' he said. ''And number one, he's real popular with the female population because he's a good looking man.''
--from a CNN news story.

Anyone assuming that Kerry or any other Democrat can run on a rational basis. They don't know what they stand for so they have to hope women think they're cute. If I were a woman, I'd be offended. Since Democrats, and yes, I mean Edwards too, think you're too stupid to be appealed to rationally, they must appeal to your sexual appetite. Show them you can think for yourself. Listen to Kerry for awhile. As long as there are Democrats to talk and people to think, Republicans will win the election.

It is really a good thing that TV is such a recent invention. It is also a good thing that it has only become fashionable to be a traitor (i.e. a liberal) recently. The US would not be so great a nation otherwise. Can you imagine what the modern Democratic Party would have done with the World Wars? Americans were dying by the tens of thousands each day in both cases in wars that one might reasonably argue we had no business fighting. So what if Japan attacked us? So did al-Qaida. So what if Germany posed a threat to world peace? So did Iraq. We have toppled two dangerous governments and Afghanistan and Iraq are on the fast track to becoming the first two functioning democracies in the Arab world. Nevertheless, the traitor's lobby at home, mostly NYT editors and Democratic lawmakers, are intent on undermining the war effort any way they can.

Oh, by the way, CNN seems to make it a big point that while John Kerry has "spoken with" Nick Berg's parents, President Bush had not personally called them. So what? John Kerry can cry with them; Bush can get his men out there and avenge him.

Rush Limbaugh yesterday called for Senator Ted Kennedy (D-M.A.) to apologize to the American people and to President Bush for comparing them with Saddam Hussein over the recent Iraqi prison abuse scandal. Senator Kennedy has shown he is unwilling to do so. Nor is there any apology forthcoming from any Democratic lawmaker. Instead they keep laying it on with a trowel. They're only digging themselves a bigger hole--I suppose I should thank them--but I personally am not satisfied with that. Ted Kennedy is more than rude--Ted Kennedy is a traitor to America. He should be stripped of his position as senator and live the rest of his sorry days in disgrace. The definition of treason is as follows: "the act of betraying one's country, especially by helping the enemy in time of war(Webster's New World Dictionary, emphasis added)." Is anyone left who can argue that Ted Kennedy's deliberate attempt to undermine the war effort and wear down the will of the American people does not, in the end, aid the enemy? In any ordinary country, this would be construed as an act of treason, and punished as such (especially if the Patriot Act were as effective as its opponents claim). Such a person should certainly not be allowed to hold office in this country in a time of war. Ted Kennedy, Chuck Schumer, Hillary Clinton, Robert Byrd (the former KKK member), Nancy Pelosi and others who have publicly maligned the war effort and sought to discredit their own country are traitors to the American people. In most countries they would be shot. Here, the least we could do is clap them in irons and dismiss them from their posts. They are entitled to their opinions of President Bush and his policies but they are not entitled to endanger our country by undermining our spirit when we are engaged in a war of self-defense. We didn't attack the terrorists; the terrorists attacked us.

For those who fear that I would put the entire Democratic Party on death row: that might not be a bad idea. But no, not all Democrats are traitors. Senator Joseph Liebermann has very strongly criticized the administration on many points but he has held off attacking Bush on the war effort and has indeed sought to rally the American people in these days. Former Mayor Ed Koch of NYC is another one as is retiring Democratic senator Zell Miller of Georgia. They have found ways to voice their opinions without undermining their own country. These men and others like them are Democrats and they are Americans. Ted Kennedy and others like him are Democrats and they have become traitors. Don't settle for an apology: make them resign!

After seeing some of the images, Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said: ''I expected that these pictures would be very hard on the stomach lining and it was significantly worse then anything that I had anticipated. Take the worst case and multiply it several times over.''
from a CNN News Story.

Where's his comment on the murder video? Later in that same story CNN claims that Berg was "executed." He wasn't executed; he was murdered by savages. I don't feel sorry for the prisoners in Abu Ghraib. They are not people, worthy of respect and pity. They are sub-human savages who enjoy torturing and killing. Now for the first time the whip is wielded by another hand than theirs and they feel its sting instead of some helpless civilian. They're not enjoying it. Guess what? They're not entitled to. If Americans were really the monsters they try to claim we are on the Loony Left, or, by the same token, if we were as smart as we ought to be, we wouldn't take prisoners. They're more trouble than they're worth and we're apparently not allowed to pressure them into giving us information. Their perverted religion teaches them that they will become martyrs by killing and maiming "infidels" (which, when translated, is anyone who doesn't agree with them--fundamentalism writ large--why don't these fundamentalists get trashed in the mainstream media?). Let's make them martyrs.

John Kerry continues generalizing. Even ABC news commented the other day, on his tirade against Bush's health care program, "Senator Kerry did not provide details (of his own plan)." All he said was, "I have a plan that will place 96% of Americans on a plan within three years." Now he continues his mindless attack by suggesting replacing Don Rumsfeld with Clinton's old defense secretary. "We need a policy change," he said.

I've got a new bumpersticker slogan for the Kerry campaign: Shut up. Just vote for me.

Damn them all to hell. This is all I have to say after reading the story of the beheading of an American citizen in Iraq. These are not representative of Iraqi citizens anymore than the prison guards at Abu Ghraib are representative of American troops. But these are the kind of people we have imprisoned there and the kind of people who were "abused." And if anyone tells you that this is tit for tat, and not worse than what we did to them, tell them to sit down and shut up. Bloody murder of a civilian is NOT the same as a little discomfort to hardened murderers in PRISON. Al-Qaida are murderers, and they should be dealt with as such, and just as Iraqis are not wringing their hands and saying, "How does Al-Qaida's actions make US look?" we should not be worrying about how the actions of prison guards make us look. As Rush Limbaugh said on his show today, "It says nothing about you because you didn't do it." As for these terrorists, kill them all.

Oh this is good: the American Red Cross has listed several abuses "tantamount to torture". Anyone note what they are? Threats of execution, hooding, humiliation and brutality. That last one I grant you should not be going on and the perpetrators should be punished. But humiliation and threats of execution used, horror of horrors, to "prompt confession"? What the heck are interrogators supposed to do? "See this candy bar, Mohammed? If you tell me what I want to know, it can be yours." Give me a break. Threats have always been used in interrogation...they're effective. In fact, the US and Great Britain have found it particularly effective to threaten to turn terror suspects over to the Jordanian police, who use physical "pressure" to gain confessions. No doubt the Red Cross would find this "tantamount to torture" as well.

The rest of the world is laughing at us, not for the reason the media suspects, that they can't believe our atrocity, but because they can't believe our naivety. During the Watergate scandal, when the American media was stunned, the media in China and Russia (whose leaders did that sort of thing for a living) was like, "So what?" They're doing the same today, you had better believe. Yes, the United States needs to end this abuse of prisoners, but don't act like this is the first time it's ever been done or even that the rest of the world is that concerned about it. The only thing most of them like is that it is weakening the will of the people to fight this just war on terror.

I think I will take a break from the Iraqi abuse scandal and write my thoughts on Sean Hannity's latest offering, "Deliver Us From Evil." Hannity's book chronicles appeasement throughout history from World War 2 and the Nazis to the modern day Democratic party bending over backwards for murderers like Saddam Hussein. "The lessons of history are clear," Hannity writes. "You cannot negotiate with evil. You can't sweet-talk it. You can't compromise with it. You can't give ground to it. You can only defeat it, or it will defeat you." With one short paragraph Hannity summed up what is different between the liberal and conservative approach to this war on terror. It all comes down to a matter of evil. Conservatives don't trust men like liberals do...although even liberals don't trust Bush or people like him, all the time showing remarkable trust in murderous dictators like Saddam Hussein. Hannity also rejects describing men like Hitler, Stalin or Hussein as "insane." To do so, he believes, is to downplay their evil. They are not crazy and this makes them dangerous. They are simply evil. His historic link of Islamic terrorists to totalitarian regimes (rejecting the suggestion that they are "like America's Founding Fathers.") is particularly apt and has been echoed in higher branches of learning as well.

Hannity's book is highly-recommended (five stars) and very easy to read. If you want to understand the worldview that drives President Bush and those in power alongside of him to be actually winning this war, and why the liberals can't stand them, as well as the lowdown on all of the Democratic presidential hopefuls, including presumptive nominee John Kerry, you will want to read this book!

In October of 2001, MIT professor Noam Chomsky made the none-too-original charge that the attacks of September 11th were the fault of the West. "For the first time," he crowed, "the gun is pointed the other way," and went on to say the West deserved it because of imperialism (I'd say we got cheated--we gave the non-West civilization and they gave us terrorism. What a deal!). I notice nobody has thus far said it about the remnants of Saddam Hussein's guards. Here, truly, for the first time, the gun is pointed the other way. Do the Republican Guards deserve this shameful treatment? Oh, many times over. This is not, by the way, me condoning it. In Christian circles we know it is not always good to get what we deserve. (The ones I truly pity are the Americans and Brits who fall into the hands of the Iraqis after this. Not that the treatment they get will differ from what they would have gotten at the hands of these brutes anyway. But now in the West people will think they got what they deserve.) Nevertheless, if you want to talk about crimes deserving of horrible deaths--the Iraqi Republican Guard deserved what they got far more than the victims of 9/11 (who had not participated in imperialism or harmed anyone in an Islamic country). I do not condone these acts of barbarism done to the Republican Guards--the perpetrators should be punished for giving the coalition a bad name. But the loony libs should stop making political hay with it--neither Bush nor Rumsfeld ordered this and it does not reflect the actions of most coalition soldiers. In fact, most of the soldiers, although this has been glossed over in the major media outlets, have behaved with remarkable restraint, even rescuing the guards who ambushed them from burning buildings and holding their fire under intense pressure. If the actions of Muslim terrorists is not indicative of Islam as a whole, which to me is an improbable claim, then neither should 200,000 American troops be slandered for the actions of a few dozen at most. Get the issue in perspective.

Should Rumsfeld resign? Well, if you ask the terrorists, he certainly should. He's the main reason we're winning the war on terror, after the Clinton-induced appeasement of the 1990s. The more I study the issue the more I become convinced that the only reason Clinton isn't held up to the same scorn as Neville Chamberlain is because the 1990s were not the Great Depression. Chamberlain can't point to a great economy begun by the Prime Minister before him the way Clinton can point to eight years of Reagan's economy being wasted. Otherwise there really is no difference. Both denied reality until World War erupted. Yes, for those of you doomsday prophets who've been waiting for it--this is World War 3. America is again at war with totalitarians who are every bit as evil (perhaps more so even) as Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia. Rumsfeld is one man who recognized evil and reorganized the military to fight and win the war. He should not resign. If he wasn't so old, I would push for him to run for President in 2008. As it is, I just want him to stay Secretary of Defense for Bush's eight years. In 2008? How about Ashcroft-Rice? Meanwhile, Rumsfeld, stay put.

And the controversy continues. The same people who are trying to make Jessica Lynch, and by due course all of us, believe she was treated well by Iraqi captors are trying to convince the world that most of our coalition soldiers are guilty of "torturing" (meaning not rolling out the red carpet and providing little statuettes of Mohammed) Iraqi prisoners of war. They call what is being done in the pictures torture? It's kids stuff compared to what our troops would go through in the hands of the Iraqis. This is not to suggest for a moment I think it is actually being done--I think some clever Saddamists are using photography to their advantage. But even if it is, why are they suddenly so concerned about Iraqi prisoners when they are not even concerned about our own? When one of ours is rescued, they immediately assure her she wasn't treated badly. Yet the story she told can give the US the high moral ground over Saddam (if any needed to be asserted) even if all the pictures turn out to be genuine. This is war, people. And things happen. I'm awfully sorry for the Iraqis if they're uncomfortable as prisoners (see me cry: boohoohoo) but if they're really that soft, perhaps there's a reason our troops overran their country so quickly. Compare what Jessica Lynch SAID she endured to what the pictures show. You tell me: Who are the wimps?

UK Military Claims Pictures are a Fraud.

So what else is new? Do you think the "helpless" Muslims who have learned to fly planes into building and engineer WMD's can't fake photographs? Heck, even I can fake photographs! If I could make weapons of mass destruction, I'd be considered a threat. The funny thing, but also not surprising, is that CNN and the other media are trying to cast doubt, not on the photos, but on claims of their phoniness. And why not? These are the same people who tried to convince us that Saddam Hussein's alleged "atrocities" were the invention of President Bush to "hoodwink" the US into going to war. The British soldiers fighting in Iraq have been documented putting their lives on the line to protect innocent Iraqi civilians from murderous thugs hired by Saddam Hussein. Many times during the war itself, Iraqi Republican Guards dressed up as US or British soldiers and then shot Iraqis attempting to surrender. Do you think they would have trouble beating and urinating on an Iraqi for the camera while dressed in British gear and using scenery from another day? What is it about the media, indeed about Europe, that will cause them to call everything evil except...evil?

Does anybody else find it remotely repulsive that a German newspaper welcome ten eastern European states to the EU this week with page one photos of scantily-clad (or completely nude) women from those states? And that CNN reports this particular newspaper often puts nude photos on page? Remind me why we should want advice and input from this "height of civilization."